ABQ Journal Dinelli “Local Columnist” Article; Mayor Tim Keller’s 5 Gateway Shelters For Unhoused Unsustainable “Black Hole” Of Expenditures; Unhoused Refuse City Services; Mental Health Commitments Are Solution To Getting People Off City Streets

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The Albuquerque Journal Editorial Opinion pages feature 5 types of opinion columns submitted for publication: those by the paper’s Editorial Board, those by the paper’s Community Council, those by Syndicated Columnists, those by Local Columnists and those by Local Voices.  “Local Columnists are tasked with carrying a heavy load of responsibility to help readers scrutinize issues impacting them, their community and their country. It is the Journal’s goal to publish columnists from all walks of life and varying political viewpoints to give readers exposure to all sides of local issues.”

All headlines for Journal guest columns published are written by Journal editors and not the columnists. On May 24, the  Albuquerque Journal published on its editorial opinion page the below “Local Columnist” guest column by Pete Dinelli:

JOURNAL EDITOR’S HEADLINE: “The city should stop funneling money to the homeless population”

DINELLI AUTHORED HEADLINE:  Keller’s 5 Gateway Shelters For Unhoused Unsustainable “Black Hole” Of Expenditures; Unhoused Refuse City Services; Mental Health Commitments Are Solution To Getting People Off City Streets

BY PETE DINELLI, LOCAL COLUMNIST

Mayor Tim Keller has taken an “all the above approach” to deal with the city’s homeless crisis. It’s an unsustainable “black hole” of expenditures. Keller has established a total of five shelters that are to operate as an integrated system:

  • The Gibson Gateway Shelter.
  • The Gateway West Shelter.
  • The Gateway Family Shelter.
  • The Youth Homeless Shelter.
  • The Recovery Shelter.

In the last three years, the city has spent upwards of $275 million on homeless shelters, programs and purchasing and remodeling motels for low-income housing. In 2021, the city acquired the Lovelace Hospital for $15 million and spent $90 million to remodel it into the Gateway shelter. In the last two years, the Keller Administration spent $25 million to purchase and remodel motels for low-income housing.

In fiscal year 2021-2022, the Family Community Services Department spent $35 million on homeless initiatives. In fiscal year 2022-2023 the department spent another $59 million on homeless initiatives. On June 23, 2022, Keller announced that the city was adding $48 million to the fiscal year 2023 budget to address housing and homelessness issues in Albuquerque.

The fiscal year 2026 General Fund budget for the Health, Housing and Homelessness Department is $53.3 million. The sum includes $48 million for strategic support, health and human services, affordable housing, mental health services, emergency shelter services, homeless support services, shelter operations, substance abuse services and $4.2 million for the Gibson Gateway maintenance division.

The city is seeking funding for 116 separate services contracts totaling $53.7 million to pay for services provided to the unhoused:

  • $30.4 million for 32 affordable housing contracts.
  • $6.3 million for 12 emergency shelter contracts.
  • $2 million for 16 health and human service contracts.
  • $5.7 million for 29 homeless support service contracts.
  • $3.8 million for five Gateway Shelter operating contracts.
  • $2.2 million for 11 mental health service contracts.
  • $2.6 million for 11 substance abuse treatment contracts.

The 2024 Point In Time homeless survey found an 18% increase in Albuquerque’s homeless numbers. The PIT survey identified 2,740 people experiencing homelessness, including 1,231 on the streets, 1,289 in emergency shelters and 220 in transitional housing. The HHH Department’s fiscal year 2026 budget performance measures report emergency unsheltered as 6,103 in 2023, 7,420 in 2024, 7,257 targeted in 2025 and 8,439 targeted in 2026.

Keller has allowed the unhoused to proliferate city streets, parks and open spaces declining to enforce city and state vagrancy laws and make arrests. The problem is the chronic unhoused refuse to accept city services as Keller continues to throw city resources at the crisis.

A 2025 report by the city found 30% of individuals experiencing homelessness self report having a serious mental illness, 25% self report having a substance use disorder and around 66% experience some form of mental health condition. Too many chronic unhoused simply refuse city services.

Keller has essentially proclaimed the unhoused as “wards of the city.” The mayor’s approach is not sustainable. Such responsibility must be undertaken by the state or federal government. The millions spent to help the unhoused with many refusing services would have gone a long way to finance community centers, senior citizen centers, police and fire substations, preschool or after school programs, senior citizen programs, and police and fire programs.

A solution to deal with mentally ill and drug addicted homeless people who refuse city services is the initiation of civil mental health commitments by the state to mandate mental health care or drug addiction counseling in a hospital setting after a court hearing determining a person is a danger to themselves or others. Such an approach would get the mentally ill and drug addicted the health care they desperately need and off the streets.

Pete Dinelli is a former Albuquerque city councilor, former chief public safety officer and former chief deputy district attorney. You can read his daily news and commentary blog at www.PeteDinelli.com

EDITOR’S NOTE: Confidential sources who participated in taking the 2025 Point In Time survey count of the unhoused report that 75% of the emergency and chronic unhoused refuse to accept city emergency shelter and prefer to remain on the streets.  The 2024 legislature enacted the Behavioral Health package that will fund half billion-trust fund to build behavioral health facilities an hire personnel in 3 regions overseen by the courts to ensure due process of law and protect civil rights of the mentally ill. The county also has behavioral health tax where facilities are also being built. Mayor Keller and the city was misguided to convert the old Lovelace hospital to a 24/7 shelter and should have kept it as a hospital and use the 200 patient rooms for civil mental health commitments. Instead the  Keller Administration rezoned the hospital for a 24/7 homeless shelter. Part of the enacted behavioral health package expands the definition of “serious danger to self and others”. The Bernalillo County District Attorney is authorized under the law to initiate civil mental health commitments and get people committed for longer periods of time to compel treatment and get them the mental health care and substance abuse counseling they need, thereby making those committed wards of the state.

The link to a related blog article with statistics on the city’s unhoused numbers and city programs is here:

“Gateway Recovery” Micro-Community Made Up “Pallet Shelters” To Help City’s Homeless And Addicted; Keller’s 5 Shelter Approach To Homeless Crisis Is Unsustainable, Financial Black Hole Creating Wards Of The City; Audit Of 116 Service Contracts Involving $325 Million In Funding Over 4 Years For Homeless Services Is In Order

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About

Pete Dinelli was born and raised in Albuquerque, New Mexico. He is of Italian and Hispanic descent. He is a 1970 graduate of Del Norte High School, a 1974 graduate of Eastern New Mexico University with a Bachelor's Degree in Business Administration and a 1977 graduate of St. Mary's School of Law, San Antonio, Texas. Pete has a 40 year history of community involvement and service as an elected and appointed official and as a practicing attorney in Albuquerque. Pete and his wife Betty Case Dinelli have been married since 1984 and they have two adult sons, Mark, who is an attorney and George, who is an Emergency Medical Technician (EMT). Pete has been a licensed New Mexico attorney since 1978. Pete has over 27 years of municipal and state government service. Pete’s service to Albuquerque has been extensive. He has been an elected Albuquerque City Councilor, serving as Vice President. He has served as a Worker’s Compensation Judge with Statewide jurisdiction. Pete has been a prosecutor for 15 years and has served as a Bernalillo County Chief Deputy District Attorney, as an Assistant Attorney General and Assistant District Attorney and as a Deputy City Attorney. For eight years, Pete was employed with the City of Albuquerque both as a Deputy City Attorney and Chief Public Safety Officer overseeing the city departments of police, fire, 911 emergency call center and the emergency operations center. While with the City of Albuquerque Legal Department, Pete served as Director of the Safe City Strike Force and Interim Director of the 911 Emergency Operations Center. Pete’s community involvement includes being a past President of the Albuquerque Kiwanis Club, past President of the Our Lady of Fatima School Board, and Board of Directors of the Albuquerque Museum Foundation.